E
motional intelligence is the ability to manage, recognize, or understand your own emotions and it also deals with managing, recognizing, or understanding the emotions of others. Emotional intelligence drives behaviors that impact people, both positively and negatively. The key for managers to understand is to learn how to manage those emotions from within and with others. This list of books on emotional intelligence will guide you on how to navigate change, how to work through setbacks and failures, how to deal with challenging relationships, how to meet deadlines, and even how to give or receive feedback. Emotional intelligence is a very important part for both managers who seek to influence behavior and even those who desire to simply be better.
Best Books on Emotional Intelligence: THE LIST
1. Emotional Intelligence | By Daniel Goleman
Everyone knows that a high IQ is no guarantee of success, happiness, or virtue, but until Emotional Intelligence, we could only guess why. Daniel Goleman’s brilliant report from the frontiers of psychology and neuroscience offers startling new insight into our “two minds”—the rational and the emotional—and how they together shape our destiny.
Drawing on groundbreaking brain and behavioral research, Goleman shows the factors at work when people of high IQ flounder and those of modest IQ do surprisingly well. These factors, which include self-awareness, self-discipline, and empathy, add up to a different way of being smart—and they aren’t fixed at birth. Although shaped by childhood experiences, emotional intelligence can be nurtured and strengthened throughout our adulthood—with immediate benefits to our health, our relationships, and our work.
The twenty-fifth-anniversary edition of Emotional Intelligence could not come at a better time—we spend so much of our time online, more and more jobs are becoming automated and digitized, and our children are picking up new technology faster than we ever imagined. With a new introduction from the author, the twenty-fifth-anniversary edition prepares readers, now more than ever, to reach their fullest potential and stand out from the pack with the help of EI.
Quotes from Emotional Intelligence;
“The notion that there is pure thought, rationality devoid of feeling, is fiction.”
“We have feelings about everything we do, think about, imagine, remember. Thought and feeling are inextricably woven together.”
“IQ and emotional intelligence are not opposing competencies, but rather separate ones.”
“People who take the pessimistic stance are extremely prone to emotional hijackings.”
“In terms of biological design for the basic neural circuitry of emotion, what we are born with is what worked best for the last 5,000 human generations, not the last 500 generations – and certainly not for the last five.”
“We send emotional signals in every encounter, and those signals affect those we are with.”
“Knowing something is right ’in your heart’ is a different order of conviction – somehow a deeper kind of certainty – than thinking so with your rational mind.”
2. How to Win Friends and Influence People | By Dale Carnegie
You can go after the job you want—and get it!
You can take the job you have—and improve it!
You can take any situation—and make it work for you!
Dale Carnegie’s rock-solid, time-tested advice has carried countless people up the ladder of success in their business and personal lives. One of the most groundbreaking and timeless bestsellers of all time, How to Win Friends & Influence People will teach you:
-Six ways to make people like you
-Twelve ways to win people to your way of thinking
-Nine ways to change people without arousing resentment
And much more! Achieve your maximum potential—a must-read for the twenty-first century with more than 15 million copies sold!
Quotes from How to Win Friends and Influence People
“It isn’t what you have or who you are or where you are or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy. It is what you think about it.”
“Don’t be afraid of enemies who attack you. Be afraid of the friends who flatter you.”
“Everybody in the world is seeking happiness—and there is one sure way to find it. That is by controlling your thoughts. Happiness doesn’t depend on outward conditions. It depends on inner conditions.”
“When dealing with people, remember you are not dealing with creatures of logic, but with creatures bristling with prejudice and motivated by pride and vanity.”
“Any fool can criticize, complain, and condemn—and most fools do. But it takes character and self-control to be understanding and forgiving.”
“You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.”
3. Working with Emotional Intelligence | By Daniel Goleman
Do you have what it takes to succeed in your career?
The secret of success is not what they taught you in school. What matters most is not IQ, not a business school degree, not even technical know-how or years of expertise. The single most important factor in job performance and advancement is emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence is actually a set of skills that anyone can acquire, and in this practical guide, Daniel Goleman identifies them, explains their importance, and shows how they can be fostered.
For leaders, emotional intelligence is almost 90 percent of what sets stars apart from the mediocre. As Goleman documents, it’s the essential ingredient for reaching and staying at the top in any field, even in high-tech careers. And organizations that learn to operate in emotionally intelligent ways are the companies that will remain vital and dynamic in the competitive marketplace of today—and the future.
Comprehensively researched, crisply written, and packed with fascinating case histories of triumphs, disasters, and dramatic turnarounds, Working with Emotional Intelligence may be the most important business book you’ll ever read.
Drawing on unparalleled access to business leaders around the world and studies in more than 500 organizations, Goleman documents an astonishing fact: in determining star performance in every field, emotional intelligence matters twice as much as IQ or technical expertise.
Readers also discover how emotional competence can be learned. Goleman analyzes five key sets of skills and vividly shows how they determine who is hired and who is fired in the top corporations in the world. He also provides guidelines for training in the “emotionally intelligent organization,” in chapters that no one, from manager to CEO, should miss.
Working with Emotional Intelligence could prove to be the most important reference for bottom-line businesspeople in the first decades of the 21st century.
Quotes from Working with Emotional Intelligence;
“Emotional intelligence does not mean merely “being nice”. At strategic moment it may demand not “being nice”, but rather, for example, bluntly confronting someone with an uncomfortable but consequential truth they’ve been avoiding.”
“Except for the financially desperate, people do not work for money alone. What also fuels their passion for work is a larger sense of purpose or passion. Given the opportunity, people gravitate to what gives them meaning, to what engages to the fullest their commitment, talent, energy, and skill.”
“Emotional intelligence skills are synergistic with cognitive ones; top performers have both. The more complex the job, the more emotional intelligence matters—if only because a deficiency in these abilities can hinder the use of whatever technical expertise or intellect a person may have.”
“The new measure takes for granted having enough intellectual ability and technical know-how to do our jobs; it focuses instead on personal qualities, such as initiative and empathy, adaptability and persuasiveness.”
“We do not compete in our careers with people who lack the requisite intelligence to enter and stay in our field—but rather against the much smaller group of those who have managed to jump the hurdles of schooling, entry exams, and other cognitive challenges to get into the field in the first place.”
4. Emotional Intelligence | By David Clark
Would you like to have greater success in your professional life?
Would you like to increase your chances of rising to a leadership position at work?
Would you like to enjoy more rewarding and fulfilling interpersonal relationships?
Do you want to navigate more confidently through social settings?
Do you want to be able to manage your and other people’s emotions more effectively?
According to research, Emotional Intelligence (EQ) or quotient is far more important than one’s intelligence quotient or technical abilities when it comes to determining a person’s overall success in life. Emotional intelligence directly impacts the way we formulate personal decisions, the way we manage behavior, and our ability to maneuver through social complexities. The great thing is, emotional intelligence is something that everybody is able to develop with time. This guide will provide you with all the essential knowledge needed to improve your EQ.
Here are some topics that will be covered in this book:
- The art of releasing destructive emotions and replacing them with positive ones
- Restructuring and reframing negative thoughts using NLP techniques
- Proven strategies for managing internal emotional conflicts
- Tried and tested tips for dealing with the past and forgiving people
- Effective strategies for making your internal dialogue more positive
- Using perceptual positions for increasing emotional intelligence
- And much more
So, what are you waiting for? Grab your copy today and dive into the world of human psychology and behavior!
5. Destructive Emotions | By Daniel Goleman
Imagine sitting with the Dalai Lama in his private meeting room with a small group of world-class scientists and philosophers. The talk is lively and fascinating as these leading minds grapple with age-old questions of compelling contemporary urgency. Daniel Goleman, the internationally bestselling author of Emotional Intelligence, provides the illuminating commentary—and reports on the breakthrough research this historic gathering inspired.
Buddhist philosophy tells us that all personal unhappiness and interpersonal conflict lie in the “three poisons”: craving, anger, and delusion. It also provides antidotes of astonishing psychological sophistication–which are now being confirmed by modern neuroscience. With new high-tech devices, scientists can peer inside the brain centers that calm the inner storms of rage and fear. They also can demonstrate that awareness-training strategies such as meditation strengthen emotional stability—and greatly enhance our positive moods.
The distinguished panel members report these recent findings and debate an exhilarating range of other topics: What role do destructive emotions play in human evolution? Are they “hardwired” in our bodies? Are they universal, or does culture determine how we feel? How can we nurture the compassion that is also our birthright? We learn how practices that reduce negativity have also been shown to bolster the immune system. Here, too, is an enlightened proposal for a school-based program of social and emotional learning that can help our children increase self-awareness, manage their anger, and become more empathetic.
Throughout, these provocative ideas are brought to life by the play of personalities, by the Dalai Lama’s probing questions, and by his surprising sense of humor. Although there are no easy answers, the dialogues, which are part of a series sponsored by the Mind and Life Institute, chart an ultimately hopeful course. They are sure to spark discussion among educators, religious and political leaders, parents—and all people who seek peace for themselves and the world.
The Mind and Life Institute sponsors cross-cultural dialogues that bring together the Dalai Lama and other Buddhist scholars with Western scientists and philosophers. Mind and Life VIII, on which this book is based, took place in Dharamsala, India, in March 2000.
6. The Language of Emotional Intelligence | By Jeanne Segal
Learn how to increase your emotional intelligence with five simple tools.
It’s no secret that emotional intelligence plays a crucial role in your relationships. But how do you apply these specialized skills in everyday life? It’s easy–with this practical, ready-to-use guide by a renowned expert in the field of emotional intelligence and communication. Using the latest research and true-to-life examples, Dr. Jeanne Segal’s step-by-step program shows you how to incorporate the five basic tools of emotional intelligence to enhance your relationships in the workplace, at home, and in all areas of your life.
You’ll learn how to:
- “Read” other people
- Make powerful connections
- Defuse arguments and conflicts
- Repair wounded feelings
- Understand nonverbal cues
- Build stronger, more satisfying relationships
Packed with simple exercises, revealing self-quizzes, and proven calming techniques, this user-friendly guide can help you reach into the hearts and minds of others–sometimes without saying a word! Once you master the language of emotional intelligence, you’ll be able to form mutually rewarding bonds that last a lifetime. Dr. Segal’s method is a complete, hands-on approach to one of the most important life skills you will ever learn.
Quotes from The Language of Emotional Intelligence;
“Change is a more complicated process involving brain integration than is data gathering.”
“it takes real courage to go where you have not gone before.”
“Laughter helps us view frustrations and disappointments from new perspectives; it enables us to survive hard times, setbacks, and frustrations.”
“All emotional sharing builds strong and lasting relationship bonds, but sharing humor and sheer delight adds a unique restorative and healing element, reducing stress and mending fences.”
“The further you move away from experiencing your emotions, the more distant you become from others, as well as from yourself.”
“When you laugh and play, your body is calmed and energized by the release of natural opiates—endorphins that relax you physically and lift you up the ladder emotionally.”
“Because arguments require an expenditure of time and energy, we need to consider what is worth arguing about and what is not.”
7. Thinking Fast and Slow | By Daniel Kahneman
In his mega-bestseller, Thinking, Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman, world-famous psychologist and winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, takes us on a groundbreaking tour of the mind and explains the two systems that drive the way we think. System 1 is fast, intuitive, and emotional; System 2 is slower, more deliberative, and more logical. The impact of overconfidence on corporate strategies, the difficulties of predicting what will make us happy in the future, the profound effect of cognitive biases on everything from playing the stock market to planning our next vacation―each of these can be understood only by knowing how the two systems shape our judgments and decisions.
Engaging the reader in a lively conversation about how we think, Kahneman reveals where we can and cannot trust our intuitions and how we can tap into the benefits of slow thinking. He offers practical and enlightening insights into how choices are made in both our business and our personal lives―and how we can use different techniques to guard against the mental glitches that often get us into trouble. Topping bestseller lists for almost ten years, Thinking, Fast and Slow is a contemporary classic, an essential book that has changed the lives of millions of readers.
8. Emotional Intelligence Pocketbook | By Gill Hasson
A practical “how-to” guide to changing the way you think about your emotions.
Bestselling personal development author Gill Hasson is back with this pocket-sized guide to dealing with your emotions. Learn how to understand yourself and those around you with practical tips and tricks that will help you be more assertive, forge stronger relationships and manage anxiety.
Did you know that the way you approach your own thoughts and feelings determines your happiness and success in every area of your life? Just think about it for a second, it’s not necessarily the smartest people that are the most successful or the most fulfilled in life, being clever or highly skilled isn’t enough. Your ability to manage your feelings, other people, and your interactions with them is what makes all the difference.
This highly practical book is full of advice, tips, and techniques to help you:
- Understand and manage your emotions
- Become more assertive and confident
- Develop your social skills and your interactions with others
- Handle difficult situations, events, and other people
The Emotional Intelligence Pocketbook is your practical “how-to” guide for understanding yourself and those around you.
Quotes from The Emotional Intelligence Pocketbook;
“Very often, your emotions are triggered when your emotional needs are not met. Your emotional needs are what must be in place or what needs to happen for you to feel secure. Your unmet needs become emotional triggers. Typically, your emotional needs include such things as: Feeling safe and secure. Feeling a sense of control and being able to make choices. A sense of belonging – friendship, fun, love, and intimacy with significant people. A sense of purpose; opportunities and the ability to achieve.”
9. Emotional Intelligence for Sales Success | By Colleen Stanley
Emotional intelligence plays a vital role at every stage of the sales process. It’s easy to get defensive when prospects challenge you on price or to quickly cave and offer discounts in response to pressure. Those are examples of the fight-or-flight response–something salespeople learn to avoid when they build their emotional intelligence. Sales trainer and expert Colleen Stanley cite studies that show how emotional intelligence (EI) is a strong indicator of sales success–and offers tips on how you can sharpen your skills and expand your emotional toolkit. Increasing your emotional intelligence is a sure way to overcome tough selling encounters. In Emotional Intelligence for Sales Success, you’ll learn how to increase impulse control for better questioning and listening, which EI skills are related to likability and trust, how empathy leads to bigger sales conversations and more effective solutions, how emotional intelligence can improve prospecting efforts, which EI skills are most common among top sales producers, and much more. Customers can get product information and price comparisons online. The true differentiator between you and a bot is your ability to deftly solve problems and build relationships. From business development to closing the deal, emotional intelligence will drive your performance–and your success.
Quotes from Emotional Intelligence for Sales Success;
“Yet, sales continue to be a problem for many organizations because they are not addressing the core issue for lack of results, which can be attributed to poor emotion management. Chapter”
“There are a few reasons. Most pre-call strategy meetings neglect soft skills in their analysis of the opportunity. For example, what is the personality and mindset of the various people in the organizational charts? How do these individuals personally make decisions? What do you need to do or say in order to better relate to each of them? You”
“So why aren’t you doing it? No amount of pre-call planning is going to help close business if you aren’t able to ask for what you need in order to conduct business. It’s a classic case of working on the wrong end of the problem. Let”
“Who is the best/right person for me to connect with today to help me grow my”
“Although my firm works with a variety of clients and industries, our customers all have three values in common: 1. They value education and outside advice. 2. They value and invest in their greatest asset, their employees. 3. They treat their vendors like partners. I”
10. Emotional Intelligence for the Modern Leader | By Christopher D. Connors
Discover the secret to business success―leading with emotional intelligence.
Success requires more than hard work and good ideas: you need to be able to understand, inspire, and motivate those around you. Emotional Intelligence for the Modern Leader helps you hone your emotional intelligence (EQ)―the ability to be aware of, control, and express your emotions, as well as handle interpersonal relationships empathetically―and enhance your ability to lead.
Building off proven research, this user-friendly guide teaches you the pillars of high-EQ leadership. Whether it’s developing self-awareness or bolstering empathy, discover simple and easy-to-use exercises that you can make use of on your own. You’ll even learn about emotionally intelligent leaders and how they’ve utilized this skill as part of their successes.
Emotional Intelligence for the Modern Leader includes:
- Emotionally intelligent leadership―Find out what it means to lead with high EQ and how you can make it part of your organization’s culture.
- Your leadership style―Determine what your professional leadership style is and how that affects the people around you.
- Growing your emotional intelligence―Take advantage of exercises and self-assessment tools that allow you to effectively and efficiently improve your abilities.
Become the leader you’ve always wanted to be with this emotional intelligence-enhancing guide.
Quotes from Emotional Intelligence for the Modern Leader;
“Life begins outside your comfort zone. Everything you want in your life and career will come from understanding your emotions and using them to your advantage.”
11. Leadership: The Power of Emotional Intelligence | By Daniel Goleman
Daniel Goleman’s Leadership: The Power of Emotional Intelligence is the author’s first comprehensive collection of his key findings on leadership. This often-cited, proven-effective material will help develop stellar management, performance, and innovation. The collection makes available his most sought-after writings in one single volume, including:
– Managing With Heart
– What Makes a Leader?
– Leadership That Gets Results
– The Group IQ
– Primal Leadership
– The Social Brain
– The Sweet Spot for Achievement
– Developing Emotional Intelligence
“I’ve pulled together more than two decade’s worth of my writings that best illustrate EI’s positive impact on personal and organizational excellence,” Goleman says. “Consider the book your toolbox. Each chapter is a unique and useful device that helps leaders, coaches, human resources officers, managers, and educators to effectively guide and motivate others.”
Daniel Goleman was ranked one of the top ten business intellectuals by the Accenture Institute for Strategic Change, and The Wall Street Journal included him in its top-10 influential business thinkers in 2008. Dr. Goleman’s article in the Harvard Business Review, “What Makes a Leader?” received the highest reader ratings ever, becoming the Review’s best-selling reprint.
Dr. Goleman covered the brain and behavioral sciences at the New York Times for twelve years. He is co-founder of the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning, and co-directs the Consortium for Research on Emotional Intelligence in Organizations. His books include Emotional Intelligence, Primal Leadership, Destructive Emotions, and Social Intelligence, Ecological Intelligence, and The Brain and Emotional Intelligence: New Insights.
Quotes from Leadership: The Power of Emotional Intelligence;
“Similarly, of all emotional signals, smiles are the most contagious; they have an almost irresistible power to make others smile in return.”
“When people feel good, they work at their best. Feeling good lubricates mental efficiency, making people better at understanding information and using decision rules in complex judgments, as well as more flexible in their thinking.”
12. EQ Applied | By Justin Bariso
In this age of social media attacks, broken commitments, and rampant corruption, a high emotional intelligence quotient, or EQ, is more important than ever. Justin Bariso brings the concept of emotional intelligence up to date and into the real world, combining scientific research with high-profile examples and personal stories. EQ Applied teaches you how to channel your strongest feelings in a way that helps, not harms you—or others—enabling you to break down barriers and improve the quality of your relationships. You’ll learn how thoughts and habits affect emotions, and how to replace bad habits with healthier ones. You’ll see why even negative feedback is a gift, and when being empathetic can actually get you into trouble. Finally, you’ll learn how people can use your emotions to manipulate you, and how you can guard yourself against such attempts, leading to greater mental and emotional strength.EQ Applied gives you a set of practical tools and exercises that inspire you to be more helpful, move past resentment, and develop your more authentic self. By increasing your knowledge about emotions, you’ll better understand yourself and make wiser decisions. It’s time to put your emotions to work.
13. The Emotionally Intelligent Manager | By David R. Caruso and Peter Salovey
We have long been taught that emotions should be felt and expressed in carefully controlled ways, and then only in certain environments and at certain times. This is especially true when at work, particularly when managing others. It is considered terribly unprofessional to express emotion while on the job, and many of us believe that our biggest mistakes and regrets are due to our reactions at those times when our emotions get the better of us. David R. Caruso and Peter Salovey believe that this view of emotion is not correct. The emotion centers of the brain, they argue, are not relegated to a secondary place in our thinking and reasoning, but instead are an integral part of what it means to think, reason, and to be intelligent. In The Emotionally Intelligent Manager, they show that emotion is not just important, but absolutely necessary for us to make good decisions, take action to solve problems, cope with change, and succeed. The authors detail a practical four-part hierarchy of emotional skills: identifying emotions, using emotions to facilitate thinking, understanding emotions, and managing emotions―and show how we can measure, learn, and develop each skill and employ them in an integrated way to solve our most difficult work-related problems.
14. Emotional Intelligence For Dummies | By Steven J. Stein
A straightforward guide to taking control of your emotions.
Being aware of and in control of your emotions is one of the keys to success in life — both professionally and personally. Emotional Intelligence For Dummies will show you how to take control of your emotions rather than letting your emotions control you! Discover how developing your emotional intelligence can further your relationships with others, in the workplace, and at home. Emotional awareness is also a critical skill for career success, and Dr. Stein provides practical exercises for developing this skill and achieving your professional and personal goals. He also provides valuable insights into how emotional intelligence can be applied to raising children and teenagers and realizing personal happiness. Full of lively anecdotes and practical advice, Emotional Intelligence For Dummies is the ideal book for anyone who wants to get smart about their feelings and reach the next level at work and at home.
- Manage your emotions – identify your feelings, determine what beliefs cause negative emotions, and stop self-destructive behaviors
- Discover the power of empathy – read other people’s emotions through facial cues and body language and show them you understand their feelings
- Thrive at work – find a job that’s right for you, overcome hassles and fears, and develop your leadership skills
- Build and sustain meaningful relationships – discover how to take your partner’s emotional temperature and manage emotions to grow closer
- Raise an emotionally intelligent child – keep your cool with your child, coax shy children out of their shells, and get your child to be less aggressive and defiant
15. Building Emotional Intelligence | By Linda Lantieri
What’s the most important piece of your child’s educational experience? If you think it’s math, science, or reading, you might be overlooking an essential element: the capacity known as inner resilience. In Building Emotional Intelligence, Linda Lantieri presents a breakthrough guide to help children respond to and rebound from the challenges unique to our times.
For educators, counselors, parents, and caregivers, this book offers practical techniques proven to help children increase self-esteem, improve concentration and awareness, and enhance empathy and communication. Step by step, children will learn how to quiet their minds, calm their bodies, and manage their emotions more skillfully. This powerful guide is arranged according to age group and complemented by spoken-word exercises presented by bestselling author Daniel Goleman.
Quotes from Building Emotional Intelligence;
“Helping children master their emotions and relationships makes them better learners.”
“Adolescents thrive on rituals that acknowledge their growing independence and passage into adulthood.”
“Nothing can quite take the place of reading a good book out loud together. It can be calming, comforting, and inspiring. It is a powerful opportunity to bond and share in the delight of a good story.”
“When adults ignore their children’s feelings, children come to believe their feelings are not important. When we repeatedly threaten or punish children for a display of emotion, children learn that emotions are dangerous things that need to be held inside and hidden—an invitation to later depression or rage.”
“that in modern life we overuse the “fight, flight, or freeze” response, because we respond to many situations as if they are life-threatening when they are not. As a result, our nervous systems don’t have time to recover, because we are activating this response too frequently.”
“it’s helpful to focus your child’s attention on the present moment by deciding together on one thing you may particularly look for.”
16. Emotional Intelligence Focus | By Daniel Goleman and Harvard Business Review
The importance of achieving focus goes well beyond your own productivity.
Deep focus allows you to lead others successfully, find clarity amid uncertainty, and heighten your sense of professional fulfillment.
Yet the forces that challenge sustained focus range from dinging phones to office politics to life’s every day worries. This book explains how to strengthen your ability to focus, manage your team’s attention, and break the cycle of distraction.
This volume includes the work of:
- Daniel Goleman
- Heidi Grant
- Amy Jen Su
- Rasmus Hougaard
HOW TO BE HUMAN AT WORK.
The HBR Emotional Intelligence Series features smart, essential reading on the human side of professional life from the pages of Harvard Business Review. Each book in the series offers proven research showing how our emotions impact our work lives, practical advice for managing difficult people and situations, and inspiring essays on what it means to tend to our emotional well-being at work. Uplifting and practical, these books describe the social skills that are critical for ambitious professionals to master.
17. Focus | By Daniel Goleman
From the author of the #1 international bestseller Emotional Intelligence, comes a groundbreaking look at today’s scarcest resource and the secret to high performance and fulfillment: attention
“A powerful guide for taking control of our attention.” —Tony Schwartz, author of The Power of Full Engagement and CEO of The Energy Project
For more than two decades, psychologist and journalist Daniel Goleman has been scouting the leading edge of the human sciences for what’s new, surprising, and important. In Focus, he delves into the science of attention in all its varieties, presenting a long-overdue discussion of this little-noticed and underrated mental asset that matters enormously for how we navigate life.
Attention works much like a muscle: use it poorly and it can wither; work it well and it grows. In an era of unstoppable distractions, Goleman persuasively argues that now more than ever we must learn to sharpen focus if we are to contend with, let alone thrive in, a complex world. Goleman analyzes attention research as a threesome: inner, other, and outer focus. Goleman shows why high-performers need all three kinds of focus, as demonstrated by rich case studies from fields as diverse as competitive sports, education, the arts, and business. Those who excel rely on what Goleman calls smart practice that helps them improve habits, add new skills, and sustain excellence.
Combining cutting-edge research with practical findings, Focus reveals what distinguishes experts from amateurs and stars from average performers.
Quotes from Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence;
“Martin Luther King Jr. observed that those who failed to offer their aid asked themselves the question: “If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?” But the Good Samaritan reversed the question: “If I do not stop to help this man what will happen to him?”
“The antidote for mind-wandering is meta-awareness, attention to attention itself, as in the ability to notice that you are not noticing what you should, and correcting your focus. Mindfulness makes this crucial attention muscle stronger.”
“It’s not the chatter of people around us that is the most powerful distractor, but rather the chatter of our own minds. Utter concentration demands these inner voices be stilled. Start to subtract sevens successively from 100 and, if you keep your focus on the task, your chatter zone goes quiet.”
“Mindfulness helps especially for those of us for whom every setback, hurt or dissapointment creates endless cascades of rumination”
“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant,” Albert Einstein once said. “We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.”
18. The Meditative Mind | By Daniel Goleman
From the New York Times Bestselling author, a classic interpretation of all varieties of meditation.
“Goleman’s wide-ranging meditative experience imbues the volume with an authority and authenticity . . . and continues to make his writings some of the liveliest available on meditation.”—Publisher’s Weekly
The Meditative Mind is an essential traveler’s guide to the topography of the spirit for every spiritual seeker.
For the beginning meditator, the book provides a comprehensive, accessible overview of the different kinds of meditation, from Hindu, Buddhist, Sufi, Jewish, and Christian to Transcendental, Tantric, Kundalini, Tibeta Buddhist, Zen, and those developed by Gurdjeff and Krishnamurti, and introduces the reader to the basic elements of their practice.
For the experienced meditator, Goleman explores the distinct levels of consciousness developed as a result of the long-term application.
19. Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child The Heart of Parenting | By John Gottman and Joan Declaire
Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child is John Gottman’s groundbreaking guide to teaching children to understand and regulate their emotional world.
Intelligence That Comes from the Heart
Every parent knows the importance of equipping children with the intellectual skills they need to succeed in school and life. But children also need to master their emotions. Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child is a guide to teaching children to understand and regulate their emotional world. And as acclaimed psychologist and researcher John Gottman shows, once they master this important life skill, emotionally intelligent children will enjoy increased self-confidence, greater physical health, better performance in school, and healthier social relationships. Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child will equip parents with a five-step “emotion coaching” process that teaches how to:
-Be aware of a child’s emotions
-Recognize emotional expression as an opportunity for intimacy and teaching
-Listen empathetically and validate a child’s feelings
-Label emotions in words a child can understand
-Help a child come up with an appropriate way to solve a problem or deal with an upsetting issue or situation
Written for parents of children of all ages, Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child will enrich the bonds between parent and child and contribute immeasurably to the development of a generation of emotionally healthy adults.
20. Emotional Intelligence Project Managers | By Anthony Mersino
s if the project manager’s job was not hard enough–having to be not a jack of all trades but a master of them!–all the technical expertise he has learned can be completely nullified if he doesn’t have good people skills to navigate appropriately through all the obstacles each project is certain to bring. As recent research has indicated that emotional intelligence (EI) now accounts for an astonishing 70 to 80 percent of management success, there is no doubt that today’s successful project manager needs strong interpersonal skills and the ability to recognize emotional cues in order to lead their teams to success–the technical expertise the position depended on so greatly in the past simply isn’t enough anymore!
Emotional Intelligence for Project Managers introduces readers to all facets of EI and shows how emotions can be leveraged to meet project goals. Project managers strong in technical skills but needing help in the EI department will learn how to: • Set the tone and direction for the project • Communicate effectively • Motivate, inspire, and engage their team • Encourage flexibility and collaboration • Deal productively with stress, criticism, and change • Establish the kind of high morale that attracts top performers • And more now in its second edition, this unique and invaluable resource for project managers in every industry includes several expanded sections on self-awareness and self-management, as well as a new chapter on using EI to lead Agile Teams and a close look at Servant Leadership. You’ve spent years gathering the technical intelligence you need for this challenging career–now separate yourself from the pack by increasing your emotional intelligence!
Quotes from Emotional Intelligence Project Managers;
“Anticipate and Avoid Emotional Breakdowns Emotional breakdowns happen when we lose it. They are the office equivalent of road rage. Over the life of a project, we can experience significant stress. For some of us, this stress will push us over the edge and cause us to do something undesirable”
“Creativity comes from optimism, not pessimism.”
21. Becoming a Resonant Leader | By Annie McKee, Richard E. Boyatzis, and Fran Johnston
What distinguishes great leaders? Exceptional leaders capture passion. They lead for real: from the heart, smart and focused on the future, and with a commitment to being their very best.
As Annie McKee and Richard Boyatzis have shown in their bestselling books Primal Leadership and Resonant Leadership, they create resonance with others. Through resonance, leaders become attuned to the needs and dreams of the people they lead. They create conditions where people can excel. They sustain their effectiveness through renewal.
McKee, Boyatzis, and Frances Johnston share vivid, real-life stories illuminating how people can develop emotional intelligence, build resonance, and renew themselves. Reflecting twenty years of longitudinal research and practical wisdom with executives and leaders around the world, this new book is organized around a core of experience-tested exercises. These tools help you articulate your strengths and values, craft a plan for intentional change, and create resonance with others.
Practical and inspiring, Becoming a Resonant Leader is your hands-on guide to developing emotional intelligence, renewing and sustaining yourself and your relationships, and taking your leadership to a whole new level. This book is ideal for anyone seeking personal and professional development and for consultants, coaches, teachers, and faculty to use with their clients or students.
Quotes from Becoming a Resonant Leader;
“Most of us have been touched deeply by a few important people: people who, because of their feelings for us and their actions, have helped us to become who we are today. Some of what these special people gave to us was uplifting and inspiring. Sometimes what they gave to us caused pain and only made sense later. Who has been a very special person in your life? Who has shaped you and helped you to be who you are today? Write a letter to this person. Tell the person what he or she has done for you, the impact the person has had, and your feelings about how he or she has touched you. Be as honest and authentic as possible. Write from your heart. You may decide later to send this letter, but this first version should be for you.”
“significant professional growth without personal transformation is impossible.”
22. Emotional Intelligence Mastery | By Eric Jordan
Become Emotionally Smarter with a Practical Approach!
Emotional intelligence has been a buzzword in the personal growth industry and in high-level corporate recruitment strategies since 1995 when Daniel Goleman used the term for his book title and topic. As we would say today, his use of it “went viral” immediately, in the world of business and mental health in particular.
Often abbreviated as “EQ”, emotional intelligence is the personal ability you have to recognize and label your own emotions and feelings, and to use this information to steer your thinking and behavior in the desired direction. Whether you are looking to climb the career ladder with ease, thrive during social events, or simply feel more at peace with yourself, a well-developed EQ is absolutely critical.
During the course of this book, we will take a brief look at the current knowledge surrounding the subject, before exploring how you can vastly improve your own emotional intelligence with a series of simple, practical exercises.
You will learn about:
– How to observe and analyze your emotions at any given moment.
– How to connect more easily with people and build strong and lasting relationships.
– How your body reacts to your various emotional states.
– How to release unwanted and potentially destructive emotions.
– “Thought traps” and how to deal with them.
– Mindfulness and its role in developing EQ.
– How to improve your EQ in everyday environments.
– How having a higher emotional intelligence will benefit your life.
And more!
23. The Leader’s Guide to Emotional Intelligence | By Drew Bird
It has been said that great leaders have great emotional intelligence. But what is emotional intelligence, and how can you use it to develop your leadership?
Drawing on his experience of working with literally hundreds of leaders from a broad range of industries and sectors, seasoned organizational and leadership development practitioner, Drew Bird, shares what he has learned and reveals how you can get immediate results by understanding and developing your emotional intelligence.
Join Drew as he explores how core values and underlying beliefs drive your leadership behavior, before explaining the most common mistakes leaders, and organizations make when they develop leadership skills. He will also take you through an exploration of one of the most popular models of emotional intelligence in use today, before explaining in depth the simple yet effective EQ 1-2-3 process that you can use today to kick-start your emotional intelligence development plan.
Coupled with exercises, activities, and reflections, this is a one-of-a-kind guide for any leader, whether on the front line or in the executive suite, who is interested and committed to developing the very highest levels of leadership.
24. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People | By Stephen R. Covey
One of the most inspiring and impactful books ever written, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People has captivated readers for nearly three decades. It has transformed the lives of presidents and CEOs, educators and parents—millions of people of all ages and occupations. Now, this 30th-anniversary edition of the timeless classic commemorates the wisdom of the 7 Habits with modern additions from Sean Covey.
The 7 Habits have become famous and are integrated into everyday thinking by millions and millions of people. Why? Because they work!
With Sean Covey’s added takeaways on how the habits can be used in our modern age, the wisdom of the 7 Habits will be refreshed for a new generation of leaders.
They include:
Habit 1: Be Proactive
Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind
Habit 3: Put First Things First
Habit 4: Think Win/Win
Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood
Habit 6: Synergize
Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw
This beloved classic presents a principle-centered approach for solving both personal and professional problems. With penetrating insights and practical anecdotes, Stephen R. Covey reveals a step-by-step pathway for living with fairness, integrity, honesty, and human dignity—principles that give us the security to adapt to change and the wisdom and power to take advantage of the opportunities that change creates.
Quotes from The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People;
“But until a person can say deeply and honestly, “I am what I am today because of the choices I made yesterday,” that person cannot say, “I choose otherwise.”
“We see the world, not as it is, but as we are──or, as we are conditioned to see it.”
“Two people can see the same thing, disagree, and yet both be right. It’s not logical; it’s psychological.”
“Sow a thought, reap an action; sow an action, reap a habit; sow a habit, reap a character; sow a character, reap a destiny.”
“Treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is. Treat a man as he can and should be and he will become as he can and should be.”
“Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.”
25. The EQ Difference | By Adele Lynn
Co-published with SHRM. Emotional Intelligence (EI) is a strong indicator of individual, team, and organizational success. But stocking up on emotionally intelligent employees isn’t enough: you need a concrete plan for putting this valuable resource to work. The EQ Difference offers an array of self-assessment tools and team-focused exercises that will help increase and leverage emotional intelligence both in individuals and in groups. It’s filled with practical tips and suggestions for developing your own “emotional quotient,” as well as that of your peers, employees, and even senior executives. Featuring real workplace examples, Letters to Leaders, and excerpts from actual performance reviews that show the positive impact of EI in a variety of environments, The EQ Difference will help your organization achieve greater productivity, higher morale, and better employee retention — all keys to stronger bottom-line results.
26. The Emotional Intelligence Quick Book | By Travis Bradberry, Jean Greaves, and Patrick Lencioni
An accessible, how-to guide that brings focus to the unique skills that comprise emotional intelligence and incorporate these tools into your life.
EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE: THE #1 PREDICTOR OF PROFESSIONAL SUCCESS AND PERSONAL EXCELLENCE
In today’s fast-paced world of competitive workplaces and chaotic personal lives, each of us is searching for effective tools that can make our schedules, behaviors, and relationships more manageable. The Emotional Intelligence Quickbook shows us how understanding and utilizing emotional intelligence can be the key to exceeding our goals and achieving our fullest potential.
Authors Bradberry and Greaves use their years of experience as emotional intelligence researchers, consultants, and speakers to revitalize our current understanding of emotional intelligence. They have combined their latest research on emotional intelligence with a quick, easy-to-use format and cut-to-the-chase information to demonstrate how this other kind of “smart” helps us to decrease our stress, increase our productivity, understand our emotions as they happen, and interact positively with those around us.
The Emotional Intelligence Quickbook brings this concept to light in a way that has not been done before — making EQ practical and easy to apply in every aspect of our daily lives. The Quickbook will help you to:
-Engage the four unique areas of EQ: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management
-Increase your EQ through the use of these skill-building techniques
-Apply your EQ at work to develop leadership skills and improve teamwork, making you a better manager and a more desirable employee
-Practice your EQ outside the office environment to benefit your relationships with loved ones, making you a better partner and parent
-Access the link between your EQ and your physical well-being to improve your overall health
-Measure your current EQ through access to the authors’ bestselling online Emotional Intelligence Appraisal
27. The Language of Emotions | By Karla McLaren
Emotions―especially the dark and dishonored ones―hold a tremendous amount of energy. We’ve all seen what happens when we repress or blindly express them. With The Language of Emotions, empathic counselor Karla McLaren shows you how to meet your emotions and receive their life-saving wisdom to safely move toward resolution and equilibrium. Through experiential exercises covering a full spectrum of feelings from anger, fear, and shame to jealousy, grief, joy, and more, you will discover how to work with your own and others’ emotions with fluency and expertise.
Here is a much-needed resource filled with revolutionary teachings and breakthrough skills for cultivating a new and empowering relationship with your feeling states through The Language of Emotions.
28. Emotional Agility | By Susan David
The counterintuitive approach to achieving your true potential, heralded by the Harvard Business Review as a groundbreaking idea of the year.
The path to personal and professional fulfillment is rarely straight. Ask anyone who has achieved his or her biggest goals or whose relationships thrive and you’ll hear stories of many unexpected detours along the way. What separates those who master these challenges and those who get derailed? The answer is agility—emotional agility.
Emotional agility is a revolutionary, science-based approach that allows us to navigate life’s twists and turns with self-acceptance, clear-sightedness, and an open mind. Renowned psychologist Susan David developed this concept after studying emotions, happiness, and achievement for more than twenty years. She found that no matter how intelligent or creative people are, or what type of personality they have, it is how they navigate their inner world—their thoughts, feelings, and self-talk—that ultimately determines how successful they will become.
The way we respond to these internal experiences drives our actions, careers, relationships, happiness, health—everything that matters in our lives. As humans, we are all prone to common hooks—things like self-doubt, shame, sadness, fear, or anger—that can too easily steer us in the wrong direction. Emotionally agile people are not immune to stresses and setbacks. The key difference is that they know how to adapt, aligning their actions with their values and making small but powerful changes that lead to a lifetime of growth. Emotional agility is not about ignoring difficult emotions and thoughts; it’s about holding them loosely, facing them courageously and compassionately, and then moving past them to bring the best of yourself forward.
Drawing on her deep research, decades of international consulting, and her own experience overcoming adversity after losing her father at a young age, David shows how anyone can thrive in an uncertain world by becoming more emotionally agile. To guide us, she shares four key concepts that allow us to acknowledge uncomfortable experiences while simultaneously detaching from them, thereby allowing us to embrace our core values and adjust our actions so they can move us where we truly want to go.
Written with authority, wit, and empathy, Emotional Agility serves as a road map for real behavioral change—a new way of acting that will help you reach your full potential, whoever you are, and whatever you face.
Quotes from Emotional Agility;
“Life is full of diving boards and other precipices, but, as we’ve seen throughout this discussion of emotional agility, making the leap is not about ignoring, fixing, fighting, or controlling fear—or anything else you might be experiencing. Rather, it’s about accepting and noticing all your emotions and thoughts, viewing even the most powerful of them with compassion and curiosity, and then choosing courage over comfort in order to do whatever you’ve determined is most important to you. Courage, once again, is not the absence of fear. Courage is fear walking—or”
“When we show up fully, with awareness and acceptance, even the worst demons usually back down. Simply”
29. How to Raise a Child With a High EQ | By Lawrence E. Shapiro
Studies show that emotional intelligence – the social and emotional skills that makeup what we call character – is more important to your child’s success than the cognitive intelligence measured by IQ. And unlike IQ, emotional intelligence can be developed in kids at all stages.
Filled with games, checklists, and practical parenting techniques, How to Raise a Child with a High EQ  will help your child to cope with – and overcome – the emotional stress of modern times and the normal problems of growing up.
30. Primal Leadership | By Daniel Goleman
This is the book that established “emotional intelligence” in the business lexicon—and made it a necessary skill for leaders.
Managers and professionals across the globe have embraced Primal Leadership, affirming the importance of emotionally intelligent leadership. Its influence has also reached well beyond the business world: the book and its ideas are now used routinely in universities, business and medical schools, and professional training programs, and by a growing legion of professional coaches.
This refreshed edition, with a new preface by the authors, vividly illustrates the power—and the necessity—of leadership that is self-aware, empathic, motivating, and collaborative in a world that is ever more economically volatile and technologically complex. It is even timelier now than when it was originally published.
From bestselling authors Daniel Goleman, Richard Boyatzis, and Annie McKee, this groundbreaking book remains a must-read for anyone who leads or aspires to lead.
Quotes from Primal Leadership;
“As Erasmus, the great Renaissance thinker, reminds us, “The best hope of a nation lies in the proper education of its youth.”
“Not that leaders need to be overly “nice”; the emotional art of leadership includes pressing the reality of work demands without unduly upsetting people.”
“Visionary leaders help people to see how their work fits into the big picture, lending people a clear sense not just that what they do matters, but also why.”
31. At the Heart of Leadership | By Joshua Freedman
Where other books tell you about emotional intelligence, this book provides the roadmap to put it into action. There are a handful of people in the world who have proven experience raising organizational performance with emotional intelligence. Freedman is one of the leaders. Using stories and data from his work around the world with organizations such as the US Marine Corps, Schlumberger, and FedEx, Freedman provides a practical guide to this critical topic.
At the Heart of Leadership delivers a compelling case for leaders to attend to their own and their people s emotions as a critical asset for optimal performance.
Then it shows you how.
You’ll learn the Six Seconds EQ Model, a practical three-step process to become more effective with emotions plus use the code in the back of the book for a free assessment of your EQ strengths.
Quotes from The Heart of Leadership;
“When faced with a challenging or difficult situation, the best leaders most often respond with courage; less mature leaders, or nonleaders often choose another path-a path with less risk, less conflict, and less personal discomfort.”
“You can lead with or without a title. If you wait until you get a title, you may wait forever.”
“If you don’t demonstrate leadership character, your skills and your results will be discounted, if not dismissed.”
“Believe in your ability to create the future. That’s what leaders do-that is our job. Understand reality but never be imprisoned by it. Reality is a moment in time. The future has not yet been written-it is written by leaders.”
“When you expect the best from people, you will often see more in them than they see in themselves.”
“The heart is a muscle, and you strengthen muscles by using them. The more I lead with my heart, the stronger it gets.”
32. The Brain and Emotional Intelligence | By Daniel Goleman
Final Thoughts on the Best Books on Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence is critical because it is scientific fact that emotions precede thought. When emotions are high, they impact our brain chemistry, therefore, diminishing cognitive abilities, business decisions, interpersonal skills, etc. Understanding emotional intelligence helps us to be successful in both our professional and personal lives.
Happy reading!
Do you see a book that you think should be on the list? Let us know your feedback here.
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